Day 52

Today was another great day. I can’t get over how great this week has been and has yet to be. I almost wish I could space them out over the next few weeks but I’m sure I’m going to have the best last few days here. I made oatmeal for breakfast this morning before heading off to the clinic. On my way to the clinic I talked to a few new people and got my usual Twi lessons from my friends. Today’s lesson was how to say ‘Brother how are you, good morning’ I still have no idea what it is. The clinic was very quiet today so I went to the O.P.D. and talked with Mabel and Auntie Alice for a while. I mainly wrote in my journal until my friend Josephine came over and started talking to me. She always says the conversation in Twi before translating it to English. I showed the other nurses pictures of my family and friends and told them about each of my siblings. They all loved the picture with my parents especially. At the O.P.D. they were watching this horrible Ghanaian movie, which gave me a pretty good headache. Sister Ama came around with the sweet bread and I bought one from her. Around 11 I walked over to Isaac’s office to help him out with consultations. He looked at me and said ‘You are so beautiful today’. He said that the shirt I was wearing was very pretty and that I should wear it more often because he never sees it on me. I only own 5 shirts so I’m pretty sure he’s seen it 20 other times. I helped out with consultations today, which was a lot slower today. We got to talk more and I learned a lot more about Isaac. He told me about his girlfriend and how much he loved watching my movies. He left me alone with a few of the patients for a time so I talked to a couple of them and doodled in my journal for a while. I had to go to Agona to finish up what I didn’t yesterday at the Internet Café. The Internet was down at our usual café where King works, but there is another one down the street that I could go to. Everything was full so I had to wait for a while before using the Internet. Once a computer was free, I was in the zone. I spent the next 2 ½ hours with the fastest Internet connection ever since I’ve been here looking up everything I needed. I downloaded all my coursework for my Women’s Health class and even gpt recipes for banana pancakes. But the best part of the day was chatting with Audrey again. I left the Internet Café honestly confused at where I was. I had to get through an obstacle course of kids and goats for a second that helped me remember I was in Ghana. I was on cloud 9 the rest of the day. For dinner we wanted to try to make Onion Rings. This turned into quite the mess. We made a batter with flour and spices and melted a stick of butter in the pan. We first tried dipping the onion ring in butter than the flour but once we put it in the oil the batter just disappeared and it wasn’t working. Cassie said she thought we were supposed to use an egg in the batter so we cracked on into the flour and tried it from there. It was more of like a dough so we just molded it around the onion and quickly threw it in the pan. They didn’t taste half bad but it was quite the adventure. Cassie and I sat out on the ledge and ate the onion rings after Grace and Matilda had tried them. I really needed to exercise before our big trip that I am so stoked for! So I picked a 45-minute workout from my NTC app. After my shower, Cassie and I talked to Matilda and Grace about the girls at the senior high. Matilda said if you were to get a room full of 20 girls, maybe 1 of them would be a virgin. It is very common for girls to sleep around and sometimes they even prostitute themselves because they need some how to pay for their schooling. The men will tell them to sleep with them and they’ll give them stuff that they need for their schooling. Cassie asked if maybe the men were ashamed of doing this but Matilda said it was the girl’s fault. They shouldn’t be doing that. They are young in age but old in bed is a saying used very often during our conversation.. Once we were in the room it began to pour. It rained so much that we could barely hear each other. We talked for such a long time I was up till around 1. We talked about our families and other stuff. I was going to sit in my bed and write notes until I noticed that my bed was soaking wet because the rain had gotten through the window. There wasn’t anything I could do about it so I had to sleep on a cold wet mattress. Not the best night’s sleep.

XOXO Ama